
Amazon #1 Best Seller!
“When will Buddha bring the ice cream? I’d like the Instant Enlightenment Sundae, please, with no nuts. And could I have it to go?” —Murphy
We hear a lot these days about mindfulness. “Weapons of mass instruction are proliferating.” How to clear the air? To trust what’s in us and that we’re finding our way to it. With unrelenting humor, Murphy gives it a try, only to discover in himself an extraordinary truth: that contact with the finer energy animating us awakens us to a completely different level of being alive.
With over 40 wonderful drawings by Bruce M. Sherman, and Murphy’s satirical comments that make us laugh out loud, the book appeals to both of our natures, the everyday and the higher. For Murphy the daily ups and downs become necessary reminders, a call, and “we don’t have to be a certain way to wake up.” We may not be able to think or behave our way into an awakened state, yet all we need is in us, just hidden. “Nothing about me needs to change except where the attention is.”
Vibrate higher? What brings about that shift? Along with these questions, Murphy explores, with great fun: Travels in the State of Identification; Everything in Self-Help but The Self; the Leaky Boat School of Self-Perfecting; Beliefs (the Big Addiction) and Ownership (the Big Trap); and Real Estate Guides for the Mindful, including The House of Seven Gratefuls by Bee Holden.
Here is “a look beneath the golden robes of the spiritually well-endowed.” In the face of it all, whatever the hitch, Murphy always says, “But I can work with that”—an endearing attitude—and for him, sensitivity to the subtle energy can take us across the threshold to awakening. Is it possible now to embody the higher energy and let it come into life on earth?
“Exquisitely conceived and executed, with marvelous drawings by Bruce M. Sherman. There is almost nothing more difficult than to open doors in the sleeping soul with humor, but Fran Shaw is a genuine master, and does it with grace. Every page contains a small shock, pleasurable, surprising and joyous. ‘God laughs and plays,’ said Meister Eckhart. To wake up into this singing, exuberant world, the first step is to laugh. Lord Have Murphy is a funny, punny, brilliantly attentive doorway into the incredible richness of real connection with higher self and the immense world around us, of which we normally see so little. This book is very special. It has a gentle, deeply spiritual touch that you reach through its humor and beauty. I have really never seen anything quite like it. An extraordinary door into attention.”
— Whitley Strieber, radio host and author of the #1 New York Times best seller COMMUNION
EXCERPTS
PREFACE
Writing about the Mystery has its dangers, namely, “putting-one’s-hands-all-over-it.” Also, “believing-in-the-one-who-thinks-he-knows.” In the garden for a nanosecond and I become the Wikipedia of flora.
CHAPTER 1
Lord, Have Murphy
Murphy’s Law in the Now Age: If anything can go wrong, it will, to wake us up. Well, hit me over the head, a “blow” does get my attention. A sudden fear. A violent outburst. A quick deflation. Bam! That sinking sensation in the pit of the stomach. Is that the sun blazing gold across the horizon? I hadn’t noticed because my world has shrunk to the size of a kumquat.
CHAPTER 2
Murphy, Have Lord
GO WIDE, SAYS THE OCEAN, SAYS THE SKY. My new bumper sticker from Glowaii. Yes, it’s just another state, well south of the great Unknown, but it certainly has its attractions for the esotourist seeking higher ground. No mountains need be climbed. No roads need be traveled. Nowhere to get to. Ocean as far as the I can see. But it does cost to fly there. Pay how? With attention. To give what is necessary at the gate.
CHAPTER 3
Lord-and-Murphy
So I huff-and-puff to “accept” myself and others—good luck pushing that boulder up the Himalayas—all sorts of manipulationships going on there. And then—in the blink of an I!—the discovery. Focused attention yields to finer Attention, opening into light-flecked space where there is no “should.”
CHAPTER 4
Write It Up!
It’s when the writer makes “spinach” out of this mysterious process. Overlays explanations, concepts, diagrams, difficulties. Ugh. That’s when I push the chair away from the table. No more for me, thank you. Rewriting a spiritual masterpiece and making hash out of it. Streamlining the words from an awakened one into a legal brief so the rest of us can understand them. Ego usually gets a bad rap, by the way, in all this press. Why not pick on the nose? It can dominate at moments, too.
CHAPTER 5
Higher Education
I had the privilege of attending, in Amsterdam, the Sit-Chat-Ananda Institoot for Lifelong Learners. It’s a state-dependent institution of higher learning with a board-certifiable 40-year program leading to a Ph.D. in Cosmic Consciousness Through Sustainable Attention. Classes (called “groops”) consisted of semicircles of straight-backed stares directed floorward at intricate oriental rugs. At first, it was very easy for me to become very busy with pretending to be collected. In Holland we call this “going down the toobs.”
CHAPTER 6
Head Case Studies
The only problem with identification is getting identified with it—thinking it’s a problem. If there’s the aroma of minestrone in the hall, of course my mind becomes a bowl of soup. If someone ruffles my feathers, of course it’s pluck you. Golden opportunity here! To sit in my own stuff—really notice how I am—and wake up, thank you. See without interfering. Not to change things but to see.
CHAPTER 7
Maximizing the Art of Living
“People who reckon they know everything are a great irritation to those of us who do.” —Gnothi Seauton
There appears to be a blurring of the line between self-help and awakening. All we need is to redefine a few key terms so we all know what we’re talking about.
Glossary of Popular Self-Help Terms
Transformation — Transitory information about how to cope as a cheerier me.
Inner Peace — When the inner din eases due to a piece of advice.
CHAPTER 8
Wakebook
Have you heard about the great opens-the-Source software now available called Wakebook? It’s all about streaming live video of yourself. Somehow mind-here-observing connects with body-here-seen and feelings-here-interested-in-seeing; all three coming together permits perception of what’s animating the whole.
The old version used to crash because it only involved taking every painful thing you didn’t like about yourself and “pinning” it to your page (it’s Painterest!). When the accruing items reached the tipping point—Help! I can’t stand me anymore—you’d pray and hit DELETE.
CHAPTER 9
Picture This
In the moments we embody the finer energy, the Goodness of it flows through us into the world. Can it be? The shift we are seeing at times, in ourselves and others. Old mind receding. Something new in our way of being alive.
Picture this:
• At any moment, freedom
• Coming into the silence
• Filled each second with Attention
• What we wish for is here now
CHAPTER 10
Metamurphosis
Once upon a time there was a sensitive little caterpillar living in a forest. All there was to do all day was eat leaves. Eat leaves and taste things with his feet. But it was a harsh existence. Others were always trying to chew him up.
ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY
My Father’s House Has Many Mansions
Searching for your place in this world? Hungry to come home? Here are the most helpful guides to today’s real estate market for the mindful.
Change Your Dome, Change Your Life By Geo D. Zak and Iggy Lou
Forget the “old-energy” houses of bricks and mortar. “Dome-iciles” are the Way of the future. These tips for living in your head will change how you live in your head. Over 50 ways to make your skull the best place to dwell, including such chapters as “Trash the Ego and Dance the Tao in Your Head,” “Do More By Doing Less in Your Head,” and “Cotton Batting Between the Ears.” No thoughts, no problems! majordomo.com.
WHAT READERS ARE SAYING
“Inner humor! It’s delicious every time I pick it up. A heartfelt poke that may change what you ‘think’ transformation really is. It may bump up against the current craze, but that’s good. Thank you, Murphy. I’m on the same path as you.”
“Wit and wisdom. Unforced wit. Unpretentious wisdom. If you’re a veteran on a spiritual path with a new age tincture, reading this book will be like taking off your glasses and giving them a good cleaning.”
“This book is very funny, touching, quirky, and enlightening. It takes a little while to acclimate to the author’s style, then it clicks! It is filled with wisdom, and it is the most refreshing and entertaining book I’ve read in a long time. The art is beautiful.”
“It’s very hysterical, and the artwork really works. There is a finer energy that resonates throughout of being awake and present. Thank you, Murphy, for reminding me to pay attention.”
“A funny, laugh out loud, engaging book on spiritual enlightenment. We are shown how being attentive can be our greatest teacher.”
“I love it. It’s so brilliant. It’s a clarion call but it uses humor instead of bludgeoning you. The great thing is that you laugh out loud but it’s pertinent and you take away a lesson from it. It’s fantastic. I love the device of the Editor–really explicates it perfectly.”
“Lord Have Murphy is a must read. You are just about finishing laughing at the end of one page only to begin again on the next. The main message that I found was that you need to pay attention to the moment. I gave this book five stars.”
“It is very funny, thought provoking, and the drawings are awesome.”
“Love this book! Murphy’s observations are so funny. Murphy’s questions are my questions. Unlike ‘religious’ books that separate us, this book unites us. No matter what comes, my new attitude is, ‘But I can work with that.’”